We must humanize our heroes

We do it all the time, in fact. When loved ones pass away, we grieve, we share heartfelt stories, we dust off old photos, and we remember. Through the living, the deceased live on.

But a more daunting question remains unanswered: How do we pay respects to complete strangers who happen to be our country’s heroes? How can we bring these soldiers to life if we have no photos to dust off or memories to reflect on?

Recently I visited the Normandy American Cemetery, where two juxtaposing sights made an impression on me: Young children, oblivious to their surroundings, excitedly ran around while an old veteran slowly buckled his knees at his comrade’s grave.

I understood more than the kids could even attempt to grasp, yet I was clueless compared to the man who could match faces to the engraved names. Being stranded in a limbo of knowledge and naivety forced me to re-examine what I know and how I remember our soldiers.

Although history class equipped me with solid background information, there were still considerable chinks in my armor of knowledge. I could tell you without hesitation that there are 9,387 graves in the cemetery, but if you were to ask me how much sacrifice and bravery gushed from these young souls, I would choke on an uncomfortable silence; there’s no solid number for that, and there never will be. All along, I had been gathering concrete nuggets of information like Easter eggs. When it came to the lives lost, however, the facts were nothing but empty eggshells. Something had to change.

So I stopped counting the crosses. I stopped right in front of a grave that read, in carefully etched lettering, “Florien V. Pomerleau.” I stood entranced, absorbing the infantry and division numbers, home state, and finally, the day this man drew his last breath. Suddenly I felt something more real than anything statistics could provide.

That night, curiosity led me to unearth more details about this man from the 1940 Census in an online archive. His full name appeared alongside an even fuller family: a mother, father, three brothers and two sisters. According to the census, Florien Pomerleau was 14 years old in 1940, meaning he died at the young age of 18 in the Battle of Normandy. I was absolutely awe-struck.

Uncovering slivers of this stranger’s life by no means spelled out his thoughts or dreams, but it left room to wonder. How did he feel as he trekked Normandy soil? Was he the comedian who cracked jokes to raise spirits among his buddies? Did he save someone’s life, or did someone prolong his?

Knowing that a young man gave his life for a tremendous cause evokes a sense of sacrifice, but understanding his life around it adds an entire dimension.

To grasp what these soldiers gave, it’s crucial that we understand what they had. We can’t possibly delve into all the lives lost, but in the end we know two things: Here lies a man with a unique story, and this is true nearly 10,000-fold.

Inscribed in the Normandy American Cemetery chapel is: “I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish.”

Let’s make sure they never do.

Tiffany Mi of Plano is a junior at Plano West High School and a Student Voices volunteer columnist. To respond to this column, send an email to voices@dallasnews.com.

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